Rams general manager Les Snead opted to deal away the team’s first-round draft choice, the 31st pick overall, Thursday night. The Rams will have four selections among the top 100 in the draft, including the 13th pick of Friday’s second round. (Photo by Victor Decolongon/Getty Images)

THOUSAND OAKS – The Rams waited three years to finally have a first-round draft pick again. Now, they’ll have to wait a bit longer.

The Rams traded the 31st overall pick in Thursday’s NFL draft, plus an additional sixth-rounder (203rd overall) to the Falcons for the 45th overall pick and an additional third-rounder (79th overall). The trade gives the Rams four picks in the draft’s top-100, equaling the total amount they’ve had in that range over the past two drafts combined.

But for the third consecutive year, the team won’t select a single player from the draft’s top 32. When asked about that dearth of top picks during his tenure, Rams coach Sean McVay grinned.

“It feels par for the course,” he joked, following his third consecutive draft without a first-round pick.

Indeed, in the Rams’ war room, that turned out to be the theme of the draft’s first night. The opening round, aside from a few surprises, played out largely as Rams brass had planned. Given the glut of talent in the second and third rounds, as well as the team’s recent propensity for draft trades, it was widely believed the team would explore every option to trade out of the first round. Over his past two drafts as Rams general manager, Les Snead has traded down a total of six times.

This time proved no different. Barring an unexpected tumble from one of the top targets on their board, the Rams assumed ahead of time that a trade might be their best option. The team considered several scenarios before the draft, but in the one that ultimately played out, adding an extra third-round pick made the most sense, Snead said.

Rams brass considered several potential offers throughout the day from those interested in the 31st pick, which comes with a valuable fifth-year option. With one pick to go, Snead wrapped up the deal with the Falcons, where he once worked under general manager Thomas Dimitroff. The Falcons ultimately selected Washington offensive tackle Kaleb McGary, who took a draft visit with the Rams.

“Early in the process, we knew the pool of players that we might be dealing with,” Snead said. “You always have, ‘OK, there are a few favorites who did fall, who you didn’t project to, maybe you hold pat and pick.’ But if those chosen few didn’t, we felt it would be better to add another third-round pick.”

Those chosen few apparently did not include two of the draft’s presumptive top offensive line prospects, Florida tackle Jawaan Taylor and Oklahoma’s Cody Ford, both of whom were still available with the 31st pick. Top cornerbacks Greedy Williams of LSU and Byron Murphy of Washington also remain on the board.

But at defensive line and linebacker, where the Rams are perhaps thinnest, the draft’s top available options were long gone. Thirteen defensive linemen and edge rushers were selected in the first round, four of which came in the first seven picks.

“There might not be players at the positions you felt were worthy,” Snead suggested.

Both of those positions could be reasonable options on Friday, when the team will have four picks. The middle of the draft is where the Rams have done some of their best work in recent years, with budding stars like Cooper Kupp and John Johnson, among others, coming off the board with fortuitous third-round selections. That success, Snead said, has made the team more comfortable with compiling picks in the middle of the draft.

The Rams have been relegated to those rounds largely because of their most recent first-round pick. They last chose in the top round in 2016, when they packaged a collection of high picks to move up to No. 1 overall and select quarterback Jared Goff. Now, with the draft capital from the Goff deal finally restored, the Rams decided to add more picks in this draft, anyway.

With those picks, the Rams will likely address their defense, which has gone largely ignored over the team’s past four drafts. Since selecting Aaron Donald and Lamarcus Joyner in the top two rounds in 2014, the Rams haven’t spent a single top-90 pick on a defensive player. They’ll have two chances to rectify that odd streak on Friday, with the 45th and 79th overall picks.

“There are going to be some really good football players drafted tomorrow,” McVay said. “We’re hopeful, with the way we’ve got this thing set up and what we anticipate for tomorrow and what the game plan is, that we feel really good about those four players.”

For one night, at least, the board worked out as planned. That ultimately meant spurning the chance to select in the first round for the first time since the franchise’s first draft in Los Angeles.

But it also means the Rams will come into Friday with more firepower than they would have otherwise. And with four picks on tap for the second and third rounds, Snead confirmed that there are still plenty of targets left on the Rams draft board.

Ryan Kartje is a sports features reporter, with a special focus on the NFL and college sports. He has worked for the Orange County Register since 2012, when he was hired as UCLA beat writer. His enterprise work on the rise and fall of the daily fantasy sports industry (http://www.ocregister.com/articles/industry-689093-fantasy-daily.html) was honored in 2015 with an Associated Press Sports Editors’ enterprise award in the highest circulation category. His writing has also been honored by the Football Writers Association of America and the U.S. Basketball Writers Association. A graduate of the University of Michigan, Ryan worked for the Bloomington (Ind.) Herald-Times and Fox Sports Wisconsin, before moving out west to live by the beach and eat copious amounts of burritos.